Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL, ETR:APC). and Nvidia are expected to join a multi-billion dollar funding round led by Thrive Capital that would value OpenAI at more than $100 billion.
The Wall St Journal reported that Apple is in talks to invest in the generative AI start-up, whose ChatGPT will feature in future versions of iOS.
Apple is expected to integrate ChatGPT with Siri later this year. Reports also suggest the company initially considered having Apple Fellow Phil Schiller join OpenAI’s board, a plan that now appears to have been shelved.
During its 2024 developer conference, Apple unveiled a range of AI features under the name Apple Intelligence, which will be exclusive to the iPhone 15 Pro and later models. However, Apple Intelligence has certain guardrails and limitations compared to OpenAI's ChatGPT.
To address this, Apple signed a deal to direct user requests that fall outside Apple Intelligence's scope to ChatGPT in a future version of iOS 18, similar to how Siri currently relies on Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) for some queries.
Apple has indicated plans to support other AI chatbots in the future, including Google's Gemini. However, Apple’s software lead, Craig Federighi, stated that the company chose ChatGPT first because "we wanted to start with the best".
Nvidia and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) may also invest
Soon after the news about Apple dropped, Bloomberg reported that Nvidia was also in the mix. There is already an existing relationship between the two with Nvidia operating as a key supplier to OpenAI, which relies on Nvidia’s chips to help power its AI services.
Microsoft is already a primary strategic investor in OpenAI and owns a 49% share of the AI startup’s profits after investing $13 billion since 2019.